Influenza Vaccine Research

To get the flu vaccine or not to get the flu vaccine? This is a huge controversial question millions of Americans today ask themselves every year. There are many myths that come along with the topic of the flu vaccine that lead to people questioning the effectiveness of the medication. Safety for our families and loved ones is what we aim to achieve, but what are the pros and cons of this vaccine? What are the consequences and what are myths, but most importantly: what are the reasons we should get it in the first place? In this paper you will learn the many reasons for the flu vaccination and how it affects different populations beginning with children all the way to the elderly population. First of all, what is the flu

Influenza viruses are divided into three classes. These are A, B, and C. Influenza A and B are blamed for the increases in hospitalization and deaths each year. The aim of receiving an annual vaccine is to prevent spreading infections. Since flu outbreaks vary, it is recommended that individuals receive a vaccination for the flu

Health care governments have endorsed an assortment of vaccination policies and mediations to safeguard against the known dangers of influenza communication, with longer patient stays, absenteeism, intermissions in health care, and death. Studies assessing the consequence of health care workers vaccination found that health care workers influenza vaccination was linked with a decrease in patient death (Murana, 2014). Assessing the results of health care worker influenza vaccination on patient results anticipated that if all health care workers were vaccinated, patient influenza infections could be stopped.

Last year, only twenty-six percent of eighteen to forty-nine year olds got the flu shot (Singh, 2014). With an average of 200,000 people hospitalized annually due to flu-related symptoms, these low vaccination rates are generating serious health risks among young adults all over the country (National Consumers League, 2013). This winter, at Duke University Medical Center in Durham, N.C., the average age of people hospitalized with influenza was 28.5 years old, and of those that ended up in the Intensive Care Unit of the hospital, only two of the twenty-two had received the flu vaccination (Singh, 2014). The primary reason that young adults do not get the influenza vaccination is that they believe that they are invincible and influenza is not a serious illness (Singh, 2014). One in five Americans who do not receive the influenza vaccination claims that influenza is not a serious illness (National Consumers League, 2013). Of the Americans who do not get vaccinated, forty-five percent cited their good health as a rationale for bypassing vaccination (National Consumers League, 2013). This may be partly due to the targeted measures by the Center for Disease Control (CDC) to increase vaccination rates among children and the elderly. In comparison to the twenty-six percent of young adults that were vaccinated, 56.6% of children (ages six months to seventeen years old) and 66.2% of seniors (ages 65 and older) were vaccinated. When targeted measures are used, they work. The problem

Immunization rates still remain low and hospitals that have voluntary programs in place, are not seeing the results they would if mandatory vaccine programs were put in to place. A mandatory influenza vaccine policy is the best solution to this issue and long overdue. Health care-associated influenza occurrences are becoming more common as it contributes to patient mortality and morbidity (The American Academy of Pediatrics, 2010). Thus, proving even further the need to prevent and control influenza by putting the health and safety of our patients first.

Seasonal influenza is a major cause of mortality and morbidity in the industrialized world. The United States alone averages more than 23,000 influenza-associated deaths annually (Cortes-Penfield, 2014). Everyone is given the option to receive the flu vaccination each year. The vaccine is offered in health care facilities, clinics, and pharmacies around

Annually there are a number of children who contract the influenza during the influenza season that results in an increase in costs in pediatric office visits and antibiotic and other medications consumption and also in a significant increase in absences from school and work. Thus influenza vaccination of children can help reduce the number of visit to pediatric office,  hospitalizations, and help prevent the spread of influenza in the wider community. Moreover vaccinating children is cost effective when considering all the cost of treatment for influenza and its complications. Therefore yearly vaccination of children with the inactivated influenza vaccine save  parent money and time away from the pediatric clinic. Influenza vaccine does not

The problem can be better quantified by gaining understanding of the importance of receiving the flu vaccination. The manager of any health care facility should ensure that staff and patients, specifically those with a higher risk of contracting the flu, receives the yearly influenza vaccination. Health care staff that does not comply with yearly influenza vaccinations should be transferred to a unit with limited patient contact. High-risk patients who are not compliant with receiving the vaccine are to receive further education of the deadly effects associated with developing the influenza virus. In all patients it is imperative to provide proper patient

In recent years encouragement to get flu shots has become a yearly mantra. Elderly, children six months to two years, health care workers and immune-deficient people are urged in the strongest terms to go to their doctors or clinics and get a flu shot. This group encompasses about 98 million people. In the fall of 2004 this was in the forefront of American and to some extent the Western World media with the shortage of this flu seasons vaccine. Current medical wisdom states that flu shots are safe, effective and prevent mortality. A recent study published by The Journal of the American Medicine Association (JAMA) has brought the current wisdom into question. On February 14, 2005 JAMA

From Mayo Clinic “Influenza is a respiratory infection that can cause serious complications, particularly in young children, older adults and people with certain medical conditions. Flu shots are the most effective way to prevent influenza and its complications”. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends that everyone 6 months of age or older be vaccinated annually against influenza. Especially those vulnerable people of chronic diseases. With the winter is coming, many of the world's population suffer from influenza infection, which kills many people across the globe and on an annual basis, according to the national health of Canada, the

Seasonal Influenza is identified as extremely deadly; the conditions that may arise from being infected with the virus can lead to many complications with some resulting in death for many high risk patients (Hooper, Breathnach & Iqbal, 2014). According to Hooper et al. (2014), high risk group of individuals who should avoid contracting the virus include: children below 6 months, immunocompromised individuals or pregnant women, the elderly and all healthcare workers who may have exposures (Hooper, 2014).

Summary: This article discusses reasons that children over six months should receive annual flu vaccinations (Komaroff). Dr. Anthony Komaroff talks about four reasons to get protected from the flu; the flu can be hazardous to chilren, the flu vaccine does not give a person the flu, “the flu shot is safe” and the vaccine protects more than the recipient (Komaroff). The flu can be hazardous to chilren, especially for children who suffer from asthma or have “chronic health problems” like diabetes (Komaroff). There are strains of the flu that are “particulary danferous for” children, some can even result in death (Komaroff). The flu vaccine does not give a person the flu because the vaccine is made of “virus that had been killed” (Komaroff). There

In patients sixty-five years and older how does the use of an influenza vaccine contrasted to not obtaining the vaccine reduce their chance of acquiring pneumonia during the flu season? “In 2005, pneumococcal disease and influenza were the eighth-leading cause of death in the United States and the primary cause of infection-related mortality for all age-groups” (Assaad, El-Masri, Porhayman, & El-Sohl, 2012, p. 453). Vaccination for influenza is widely identifiable as one of the most efficient and cost-effective public health interventions. (Wheelock, Thomson, & Sevdalis, 2013, p. 893). Approximately 90% of deaths caused by these illnesses occur among adults sixty-five years of age or older. It is hypothesized that the impairment to the airway epithelial lining triggered by influenza fosters bacterial growth, and that in turn bacterium-derived proteases boost virus-related virulence. There are several studies that have been established that show vaccinating the population of older patients, aged sixty-five and older, has shown a decrease in developing pneumonia during flu season. In a sizable study that included Swedish patients aged ≥ than 65 years old showed that immunization with the flu vaccine resulted in a 29% decrease in the occurrence of all-cause pneumonia and a 35% drop in the death rate from all-cause pneumonia in the vaccine group. Moreover, patients who were admitted in the hospital for influenza or

In recent year, increasing attention has been given to vaccination strategies that exploit herd protection against influenza in the most vulnerable population such as the elderly over 65 years old and young children because of limitations of direction vaccination in these populations 96,97.

The assessment reviewed mortality of nine flu seasons from 1996 to 2005 that rendered 115,823 deaths in addition to 20,484 deceased during ‘laboratory-defined flu seasons’ (Fireman, 2009). What exactly does this data present? That the widely accepted belief of the flu vaccination fails to reduce mortality rates the way in which information is portrayed. It is relevant to remain aware that the efficacy of the influenza vaccine is reliant upon a close match of the strain that is in circulation to which, LAIV is recommended for individuals between the ages of two to forty-nine and TIV for that of six months and older. Thus, regardless of what virus is in circulation and if one chooses to receive the vaccination, the recipient’s immune system response, has the final